No-phone law won’t be a hangup for most
Staff writer
As summer break reaches its muggy conclusion, parents, students, and school districts are grappling with a two-pronged state law aimed at banning cell phone use during school hours and restricting teacher-student communication through social media.
Signed by Governor Laura Kelly on March 19, the law prohibits “students from using personal electronic communication devices during the school day” and “school employees from communicating with students through social media platforms for official school purposes.”
The provisions don’t apply to online or virtual schools as defined by the state.
Not much will change for Marion schools when classes begin next week, however.
The district has had a “bell to bell no cell” policy for two years. Under that policy, students couldn’t use personal devices — including cell phones, laptops, tablets, and smart watches — while in class, but were permitted to use them during breaks.
Students no longer will be able to use their phones at all during school hours, making “eight hours of no power” seem like a more fitting slogan.
“We believe with this new law that we’re probably making it a little worse than it was before, as far as the policy,” superintendent Justin Wasmuth said. “But we’re going to stick with it.
“We’re going to have pouches everybody will have to use before school, and then take it when they leave. We have protocols ready to go. We’ve sent out an email letter to parents to let them know.”
Students will place their phones in the pouches as they arrive each day. An office worker will collect the pouches and store them in a secure area of an office, preventing students from accessing them and the phones from being stolen.
The law encourages students to leave phones at home or in a safe place in vehicles. It also requires schools to have a phone available for students to call or receive calls from parents or guardians in case of an emergency.
“I know a lot of people are worried about, ‘Well, what if I have an emergency in the middle of the day and I can’t reach the kid’s cell phone. What am I supposed to do as a parent?’ Shyla Harris, whose daughter is entering sixth grade, said. “I mean, look back at history. When there weren’t kids with cell phones in school all day, parents still got in contact with the kid, and they came out just fine.”
For Marion students, the change means a stricter policy.
“Stricter in the sense that you now don’t have a cell phone all day,” Wasmuth said. “You’re telling the kids to keep them in their car or keep them at home.
“I think it loses some trust in those kids that we had the last couple years, which is really sad to say the least. It also puts a lot more burden on some employees who will have to look and make sure we have all the cell phones or make sure the kids are doing what they’re supposed to do with the cell phones.”
For Jordy Raymer, a senior-to-be and principal’s son who is involved in almost every corner of campus life from football to student council, the only thing that may be different is not having his phone during lunch.
“We had our cell phone policy last year,” he said. “The only thing that I do kind of think might be weird at the start is not having it at lunch and maybe not being able to text people who don’t go to your school. But at the same time, most kids aren’t really doing that anyway. So, I don’t think it’ll be that much of a big issue.”
Judy Gautschi, a former district employee whose grandchildren attend school in Marion, said she thought the law ultimately will benefit students.
Gautschi said she also understands both sides of the argument.
“What if the bus doesn’t show up or they miss the bus? How are they going to get home?” she said. “But on the other hand, the kids could be texting back and forth, and they’re not listening to the teacher. They’re not getting the full use of their learning experience.”
Jordy agreed.
“It does encourage you to not just ignore and shut yourself off, and you have to kind of be alive,” he said. “You have to be present and be around everybody. With our phones, it’s really easy to just leave conversations just by pulling it out and getting on it. This will encourage ways to figure out how to move around stuff and create human relationships.”
Harris, who teaches elementary school, said she thought the law will promote human relationships. She saw world adverse effects that the COVID-19 pandemic had on students’ social lives when classes moved online.
“It’ll help with face-to-face communication,” she said. “I think COVID-19 and going online permanently for those few years really affected the socialization of kids in the normal classroom. I think this law will help students, hopefully, be more … apt to be involved in classroom talk and project work.”
There must be, Gautschi said, some form of balance between knowing when to tune in and when it’s OK to get lost in reels and social media.
“Balance is very important in today’s world,” she said.
But the new law goes beyond students’ cell phones.
Its second prong limits how teachers and students can communicate outside of the classroom.
The issue can become particularly concerning in cases involving inappropriate teacher-student interactions, such as a recent incident in Peabody involving a teacher who now faces charges.
Under the new law, private and direct communications between school employees and students through social media are prohibited, as is the use of social media for assignments or extracurricular activities.
Social media platforms listed under the law include, but are not limited to, Snapchat, Instagram, X (formerly known as Twitter), and TikTok.
“Social media platform’ means an online website or application that permits a person to become a registered user, create an account or a profile for the primary purpose of creating, sharing, or interacting with user-generated content that is publicly viewable by users,” the law states.
As a result, Wasmuth said, school districts throughout the county have agreed to use a platform such as Apptegy for school updates and teacher-student communication.
Teachers can use the platform to send one-way messages to students about assignments or provide feedback. Each district will have its own app.
“That’s what we decided as superintendents,” Wasmuth said. “We talked about it and we felt like this was the best route to go … since we already used the platform itself.”
With school just a week away from beginning, changes are taking shape.
“We’ll be ready by the 19th,” Wasmuth said. “That’s our date we will start, and we will be as ready as possible.”